Fresh allegations of systemic misuse of public funds have emerged against St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ former Unity Labour Party administration, just months after the party lost its grip on power in the November 27 general election. The most prominent accusation centers on an unauthorized EC$250,000 payout from the National Lotteries Authority to a local contractor, earmarked for the long-delayed Langley Park Playing Field project, approved only eight days before voters headed to the polls.
Internal documents obtained exclusively by iWitness News, whose authenticity has been verified by multiple senior insider sources, lay bare the questionable transaction. The contractor submitted an undated funding request to a senior NLA management official, referencing a prior conversation with a sitting ULP cabinet minister. The request, which contained several noticeable spelling and grammatical errors, listed vague planned works ranging from tree clearing and site grading to concrete work for on-site toilet facilities, with no formal cost breakdown or construction timeline attached. Despite the lack of detailed project documentation, the request carried a signature matching that of the former senior ULP minister, along with the date November 19, 2025 — just one week and one day before election day.
What has raised further red flags for investigators and opposition officials now in power is the timeline of the payout. The contractor cashed the EC$250,000 check the very next business day after receiving it, walking away with the full sum in 2,500 EC$100 bills. When the NLA’s new board of directors, appointed by the incoming New Democratic Party government, conducted an on-site inspection of the Langley Park site in March 2026, inspectors found no evidence that any construction or preparatory work had ever been carried out on the project.
The Langley Park Playing Field has been a flashpoint of political controversy in the North Windward constituency since 2020, when then-ULP Member of Parliament Montgomery Daniel first promised the facility ahead of that year’s general election, on the campaign trail in September 2020. “We would establish a playing field at Langley Park so that we will be able to move on,” Daniel told voters at the time, and he went on to win a fifth consecutive term in office for the ULP.
By May 2023, with no visible progress on the project, then-opposition NDP candidate Shevern John seized on the unfulfilled promise as a core example of the ULP administration’s failed development commitments in the constituency. Speaking at an NDP campaign rally that month, John called out the ULP for performing two empty groundbreaking ceremonies for the same project without ever allocating budget to move construction forward. “Where is the playing field today? Where is it? It is nowhere because they have not allocated anything for it. They have no development plan for the people of this constituency,” John told supporters.
In January 2025, during the annual budget debate in parliament, Daniel again reiterated the ULP’s pledge to deliver the playing field that year, saying, “At Langley Park, we continue to do several road programs. We continue to build a number of houses, and this year we will have the playing facility established in that area.” But by October 2025, on the eve of the general election, John again highlighted the project as a symbol of the ULP’s broken promises, noting, “There has been two groundbreaking ceremonies for the same playing field and nothing can be delivered.”
After John won the North Windward seat and the NDP secured a majority in the November 2025 election, the new MP and cabinet minister reaffirmed her government’s commitment to finally delivering the long-awaited community facility to Langley Park residents. During the 2026 budget debate, John told parliament that the incoming administration would follow through where the ULP failed. “The Langley Park playing field, which … had a groundbreaking twice — twice, Madam Speaker. … We will ensure that it is graded properly and that the necessary infrastructure are in place so the people of Langley Park can play their games there,” she said.
The newly uncovered transaction is one of multiple alleged cases of improper use of state resources being investigated by the new NDP administration, following the ULP’s election defeat late last year.